Elmira Mangum named vice president for budget, planning

November 12, 2009

Media Contact

Simeon Moss

Elmira Mangum, senior associate provost at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill, has been appointed by Provost Kent Fuchs as Cornell's new vice president for budget and planning.

A seasoned administrator with more than 25 years of experience in executive higher education financial and resource management, Mangum will assume her new position Feb. 1, 2010. Her nomination was approved by the Executive Committee of the Cornell Board of Trustees Nov. 11, after a strong endorsement from President David Skorton.

"We are delighted that Elmira Mangum will become Cornell's new vice president for budget and planning, following a rigorous nationwide search," said Skorton. "We enthusiastically welcome her to the university's executive leadership team."

"Elmira Mangum brings an extraordinary range of experience to this key administrative role at Cornell," said Fuchs. "She has held positions of executive leadership in planning and finance at one of our nation's finest public universities and also at a leading campus in our own outstanding state university system, making her well suited for her new role at Cornell."

Skorton and Fuchs also praised Paul Streeter, who has been serving as Cornell's interim vice president since October 2008. "Paul's strategic leadership in budget and planning for the past year has been crucial in helping the university move successfully through a difficult economic period," Fuchs said. "His stewardship and dedicated service in that role has been widely applauded."

As vice president for budget and planning at Cornell, Mangum will serve as the senior administrator responsible for managing Cornell's resources and the annual budgeting process, providing leadership in applying university resources to meet Cornell's institutional priorities and academic programming needs. Her duties also will include serving as a key liaison with the Cornell Board of Trustees, and along with the president, provost and senior staff, advising the board on the full range of policy, strategy and budgetary matters.

"I am excited about joining the Cornell leadership team and the opportunity to contribute to this great university, especially as the Cornell community reimagines its future and positions itself to remain a place of academic excellence and a destination location in the higher education community," Mangum said.

As senior associate provost at the University of North Carolina and administrator since 2001, Mangum has served on the planning, priority and financing committees that develop strategies for the university budget, construction and renovation of academic facilities; provides leadership on policy development, budget planning and financial management for faculty; and leads preparation of the operating budget. Among her administrative positions at the State University of New York at Buffalo, from 1984 to 2001, she served as associate and assistant provost for resource management and as vice provost. She played a key role at SUNY Buffalo in the development and implementation of strategies for campuswide budget management. Previously, she served as senior budget and management analyst for the Dekalb County, Georgia, finance department.

Mangum currently holds an adjunct appointment to the faculty of the School of Government at UNC-Chapel Hill and also held an appointment to the faculty of the Graduate School of Education at SUNY Buffalo, where she taught leadership theory and practice.

Mangum graduated with honors from the University of Wisconsin-Madison with two master's degrees, one in public policy and public administration and another in urban and regional planning. She received her Ph.D. in education administration from SUNY Buffalo. She points out that she received her foundation and inspiration for service at North Carolina Central University, one of the nation's historically black colleges, where she graduated magna cum laude with a B.S. in geography and education. While a student, she served in Washington, D.C., as the first African-American U.S. congressional intern on the congressional payroll as well as the first from North Carolina. She is a member of the National Council of Negro Women and the National Association of College and University Business Officers.

She also is a graduate of the Harvard Graduate School of Education Management Development Program and Cornell's Administrative Management Institute. More recently, she completed the leadership program at the Center for Creative Leadership in North Carolina.